Qin Official

White, Guan Ying's eyes were filled with crystal white snow.

Snow is not uncommon in Guanying in the northern part of the Great Wall. It is bitterly cold in Helan Mountain. It falls intermittently after October every year and does not melt until spring begins the next day.

Over the years in the frontier fortress, he experienced countless snowy days. The most dangerous one was when he followed the Liangjiazi cavalry to pursue the Huns who had entered the fortress to spy on them. They left the Great Wall for more than a hundred miles and it was snowing heavily, so they almost never returned.

The most recent one was last year, when they were protecting Polu, the eldest son of the regent, hiding in the vast frontier fortress. Heavy snow covered their tracks and put a group of exiles in trouble. Fortunately, Guan Ying was good at shooting. He and Sang Mu cooperated, and each time Zhang Cang and Po Lu can eat meat every day.

After dealing with snow for so many years, he has rich experience. Guan Ying can think of what to pay attention to when marching in snow.

But although the temperature was cold now, it was far from the point where it would snow. The large area of ​​white flowers that appeared in front of him looked like snow but not snow. His mount even happily licked it a few times...

The spear in his hand pierced deeply, and it felt as hard as earth. After pulling it out, Guan Ying brought the tip of the spear to his mouth. There were deep blood grooves on it, and there were scratches left by countless scratches on the hard bones. There were enemies. Dried blood and white particles...

After he licked one, it tasted bitter and salty.

"Salt."

Guan Ying told the more than 3,000 cavalrymen behind him: "Jiechi has arrived!"

The lake area in front of them is the famous Jiechi.

This is the salt pond with the longest history in the Central Plains. In the deep water, it is surrounded by reed wetlands, where waterfowl and migratory birds gather, and there are thousands of hectares of silver in the vast expanse. In the dry place, the brine salt in the water condenses and precipitates. The shapes of the salt flowers are crystal clear and come in various shapes. Finally, they solidify into piles of salt, one after another, looking like snow-capped mountains from a distance.

The two men brought by Guan Ying from Saibei, Five Hundred Lord Zhou Bo and the military judge were still arguing about a very stupid question:

"The flower pool is bigger."

"No, the solution pool is bigger."

The two of them are usually honest, dull and talkative people, but today they had a heated argument over which salt pond was bigger. In the end, the military judge pointed to the map obtained from the "Feather Wing Camp" and pointed at the salt pond and said:

"This pond is more than fifty miles long, six or seven miles wide, and a hundred miles around. As for the Huama Pond, all the ponds combined are no more than ten thousand acres in size!"

This salt pond was the starting point of the salt trade in the entire Central Plains for thousands of years. Before the rise of sea salt and well salt, it was almost the largest and most convenient source. The reason why Tang Yao and Xia Dynasty established their capitals in Hedong was probably to obtain salt nearby. Salt, after all, salt is just as necessary as food. If you don’t eat it, you will get sick and weak.

Because there are often strong winds and strong sunshine in Jiechi, brine salts are always precipitated every year. All the locals need to do is break them into pieces and put them into sacks...

During the Qin Dynasty, a great salt official was set up here, but now the salt mining point occupied by Guan Ying and his friends was empty with only some abandoned tools left.

"The war is in chaos. I guess the salt workers have dispersed?"

Guan Ying didn't care. As the first unit after Han Xin's army crossed the river, they just passed by Jiechi. Their real purpose was to cut off the road from Anyi to Puban and Longmen. Han Xin wanted to use superior force to The 30,000-strong army of the Zhao-Wei coalition placed in two places was eaten in one go!

"This battle is not about attacking land, but about attacking people!"

But the cavalry thought it was simple. When they came to Yishi County on the main transportation road along Jiechi, they discovered that thousands of salt workers from Jiechi were concentrated here. This group of people worked all year round. His skin was tanned, like a black worker ant on the snow, and he was still holding a weapon, not in the form of chopping wood to raise a flag, but in the shape of an arsenal...

Guan Ying thought they were accomplices of the Wei army, but these people were very happy to see the Qin army's cavalry arriving and raised the Qin flag.

Guan Ying and others were still cautious, but the other party immediately sent someone to negotiate. He was an old man wearing a Confucian uniform and a side note crown. As soon as he arrived, he revealed his identity: Li Shiqi, the leader of the wanderers in the Wing Camp.

"A month ago, I was ordered by the regent to cross the river and return to Hedong. I contacted the heroes of Hedong. I have been waiting here for a long time."

Li Shiqi pointed to the thousands of salt workers behind him, as well as a well-dressed scholar who came out and bowed to Guan Ying and others. He called himself a general and said with a smile:

"The head of the Yi family had no choice but to join a salt labor force to defend himself because of a group of thieves. Now he has killed the cronies sent by Zhang Er to monitor him. He is willing to surrender to Duke Xia!"

…

"This is not the first choice Yi made."

The next day, when Guan Ying and his cavalry had finished eating and left to attack the next county, Yiping stood on the city wall and sighed with emotion.

His ancestor lived in the late Spring and Autumn Period and was named Yidun. Yidun was originally from the state of Lu. When he was struggling to make a living, he heard the news that Fan Li, the Duke of Tao and Zhu, had abandoned his official position and started doing business and became rich quickly, so he "went there to ask for advice." Fan Li told him, "If you want to get rich quickly, you should be a domestic animal."

So Yidun traveled thousands of miles to Xihe, where he raised cattle and sheep, and later went to Hedong to start a jewelry business. Finally, after completing his primitive accumulation, he made a big deal with the Wei family, the Qing Dynasty of Jin who was rising at the time. Yidun went up every year. Pay a huge sum of money, contract a corner of the pond, and get the right to mine salt.

Rather than blowing the March south wind and waiting for the salt to precipitate on its own like the bureaucrats who had no economic ideas, Yi had people dig trenches and improve the situation. He led the brine from the deep water to shallower areas to speed up the precipitation. The salt harvest doubled every year, and then relied on the trade network accumulated through many years of business to sell the salt to Qin, Zhao, Han, Chengzhou and even Chu.

Within ten years, the Yi family became as famous as Tao Zhugong. His descendants also took root here and controlled the world's salt trade for generations. Even the salt trade near the salt pond prospered. The county seat is named after their family.

Ten generations have passed. This contracting system came to an end seventy years ago after Qin finally occupied Anyi. Although the Yi family had established a good relationship with Qin decades in advance and even invested in the return of Qin Xiangong. He had contributed to this matter, but the Qin State had adopted the method of commercial martingale and would never allow the salt industry to escape government control. The salt pond was soon nationalized and the government sent salt officials to serve.

But the bureaucrats who landed in the air still couldn't do anything good. In the first few years of Yanchi's restructuring, the output was extremely low. In the end, the Hedong County government had to adopt a compromise approach: the Yi family would succeed the Yanguan for generations. It can be said that this family is the power behind the local area. ruler……

After the death of the First Emperor, turmoil struck again. Zhao Chengguan passed the Jinliang and the Sixth Army came in in a mighty manner.

As the head of the family of this generation, Yiping decisively adopted a self-protection strategy. He sent away all the local Qin officials, and mobilized all walks of life that had been friends with the Yi family for ten generations to distribute arsenals and weapons and arm the salt workers. This hard bone made the Six Nations forwards who were determined to rob the big dog owners grind their teeth.

Finally, under the persuasion of Li Shiqi, Zhang Er agreed to let Yiping be the local county doctor.

Yiping knew very well that this situation could not last long, and the Qin army would come back sooner or later... He had not done anything before, and even tried to protect the local Qin officials. Based on this view, Yiping has been looking for the next one. The opportunity to change camps coincided with Li Shiqi's...

"Mr. Li, what kind of person is Mr. Xia?"

Li Shiqi was about to leave and headed to the next lobbying location. Yi Ping asked: "I heard that when Xia Gong was the governor of Jiaodong, he had a large-scale business development, so that thirteen merchants in Qi were able to run their own businesses, and the government organized trading companies. The tax collection under the jurisdiction has been reduced for several years, and all thirteen families are rich, and in turn they protect Jiaodong from being invaded by bandits."

Yiping has been famous for Heifu for a long time. Since the future of Hedong will be decided by Xia Gong, the future fate of his family has also come to a fork in the road...

Therefore, it is very important whether Xia Gong's policy favored Shang Yang or Guan Zhong.

Li Shiqi stroked his beard and said, "Xia Gong, he is a hero who does great things."

"How can I see it?"

"Outsiders often say that he is not like the First Emperor of Qin. He is broad-minded, does not rely solely on magic, but draws on the strengths of others, and can even give real power to Confucian scholars. It seems that he wants to implement the government of a saint, but after talking with him in detail, I found that he is that kind of person. A sage who is clearly aware of everything and believes in being the shepherd of the world likes to adapt to the changing circumstances. Previously in Jiaodong, he was just a county guard, but now as a regent, his actions will be very different..."

Heifu's rejection of feudalism made Li Shiqi a little disappointed, but he was still pursuing the ideal of a Confucian scholar. The ideal of a Confucian scholar could be put aside, but the ideal of being a drunkard in Gaoyang and making a name for himself in the world must still be realized.

"I am just a businessman, unlike Mr. Li, who has a global view."

Yiping smiled and said: "My eyes are only on my feet, this land of a hundred miles..."

"When the south wind blows, it can relieve the warmth of our people! When the south wind blows, it can protect our people's wealth!"

He grew up eating salt from Jiechi. He loves this land and knows where the foundation of his family's prosperity comes from.

"After Hedong is pacified, I hope Mr. Li can recommend a villain so that I can meet the regent. I don't want much..."

He stretched out his little finger and said with a smile: "I just want to be like my ancestors and take over this small pond in this county."

…

At this moment, in Puban, more than a hundred miles west of Yishi County, a one-sided massacre came to an end.

As the governor of Hedong County, he was a step late when he left. He stood on the military chariot and came to a messy battlefield. There were corpses of Wei soldiers with missing heads everywhere. From his position, he could still see the corpses on the river bank. The high-fortified Jingguan, as well as the Xihe army, which had blood on their hands but was laughing and scolding, immediately frowned.

"Ruicheng beheaded eight thousand people, and almost no one escaped."

"Puban beheaded fifteen thousand people and left no prisoners..."

The one who was at the forefront to kill the Wei people was undoubtedly Dong Yi's Xihe division. As the commander-in-chief, Han Xin had a laissez-faire attitude toward this approach. Because of this, the regent decided that this battle would focus on attacking people!

Xihe was happy, but in Qu Ji's view, this was just the wheel of hatred turning around and returning to the original starting point.

Qu Ji murmured: "But it can never happen again. Lord Wu An beheaded the world, which indeed destroyed the power of the six countries, but it also accumulated the world's resentment for Qin, and all the six countries hated him."

"Now that the regent has named the three armies, he is pursuing unity, not the revenge of the Xihe people against the Six Kingdoms. If he continues to kill them all like this, he will force the people of the Six Kingdoms to stand opposite our army. , fight to the death?"

…

ps: The system is stuck, no duplicates are sent, right? ? ?